George and Cynthia sat in their favorite minibar near National Portrait Gallery.
"Well, this certainly takes me back," George twisted the straw in his orange juice.
Cynthia laughed, "Back then, you used to drink orange juice because of me too!"
Her laugh turned into a warm smile as she remembered how Geroge was her guardian back in the day.
"I wonder…" He trailed off looking far behind her.
She assumed that he was recalling the good old days of the past too. Cynthia was glad that the first time she sat in a public place after her long months of confinement was with him.
This man always had her firsts, almost all of them.
She took another sip of her own orange juice wanting to take her mind off the track it was leading her on, "Hm? What are you wondering about?" She asked.
His eyes shimmered, "…Would things be different… if it wasn't for the age gap between us,"
George was five years older than Cynthia and their history was not simple. She didn't want to complicate things right now nor lose her best business ally, not that it was a concern of hers, but it was better to be safe than sorry.
She decided to crack a joke instead, "Well, Not really, things wouldn't be different. We would've both been minors and we would've still ended up drinking orange juice together anyway," she winked playfully at him.
They first started frequenting this place when Cynthia was fifteen and he was twenty, he took her here almost every day after school. It was also a day similar to this one on her eighteenth birthday, George took her here to this minibar and they got drunk together for the first time.
She slept with him on the same evening.
George was not in the mood to laugh. His eyes glided down her belly and he had conflicted emotions about what he saw, on the one hand, it was his precious Cynthia's baby and another member of the Evans family that he had to protect, and on the other hand, it was 'that' man's offspring.
Had the baby been anyone else's, he would've gotten down on one knee and proposed to his Cynthia immediately, nothing would've made more sense than that.
George took a deep breath then he sighed it all out, his fingers grazed over the magazine that sat on the table between them. The cover of that magazine was the face of 'that' man and the cheap gold digger he recently married.
An urge to beat 'that' man into a pulp grew stronger by the minute inside of George.
"...Why wasn't I informed of this, Cynthia?" his blue eyes looked betrayed as his index finger pointed at the first-page scandal that took Washington DC and the high society by a wave of storms that very week.
Cynthia looked pointedly at him. All traces of humor and warmth were gone from her face. George visibly flinched as he saw a face that he never knew his precious Cynthia could wear. Pain flickered between his eyes before he quickly changed that and tried to look calm instead.
Cynthia was getting angry.
She thought George knew better than to ask her about something that doesn't concern him the least bit. She wanted his professional help and legal advice when it came to driving her ex to bankruptcy, she had other people to help with the other things that were on her revenge list.
When she didn't answer him, George shook his head twice and then wore his trademark crooked smile that accelerated one of his dimples. She couldn't help the small smile that appeared on her face. Her anger evaporated as quickly as it came.
He was using the power of his dimples on her, knowing very well how it always worked.
"Since your face is not on any of the tabloids, I assume you already had something to do with the story that got leaked?"
Her big beautiful green eyes got a fraction bigger, her full lips puckered out. She was more stunning than ever, but she couldn't fool him.
"I have no idea what you're talking about, their personal life doesn't concern me at all," she blinked and smiled sweetly.
The tabloids highlighted two things about the newlyweds, the fact that their marriage came after the birth of an illegitimate child, and the fact that the groom was an idiot who left the sole heiress to Evans-soft and married into the Russo family. There was a small note about the bride's family being against the wedding.
That wasn't the most disturbing part.
The story that got leaked was full of specific details that had to do with the newlyweds, their favorite hangouts, restaurants, shops, and everything else that had to do with where they went and what they did.
'At this rate, paparazzi will be on their case for at least a year,' George thought inwardly.
Cynthia moved her beautiful blond hair that was straightened to perfection today from over her shoulder with the back of her hand, a move she unconsciously did when something bothered her. She wanted to change the subject.
George chuckled softly, "Alright, if you say so... You had nothing to do with this then,"
"Aha, I say so." She smiled brightly at George.
He made a quick observation that had him frowning, 'That was a quick change in her mood,'
George internally wondered if it was her hormones that were all over the place currently, or if it was a change that occurred to her personality during the long years that her husband separated her from him, 'Ex-husband now... Thank goodness,' George laughed out loud celebrating his last mental thought and startling Cynthia a bit during the process.
"Was my joke that funny?!" She wondered.
He couldn't possibly tell her what made him laugh that hard, "What can I say? You're a funny person,"
Cynthia narrowed her eyes at him, not buying his statement one bit. She accepted his invitation because there was something on her mind, he might have other agendas but for her, now was not the time to relax.
She straightened her shoulders and pulled her back up, wanting George to take her seriously, that was always a problem she had with him even when they were a decade younger.
"How long do you think it will take for the suppliers to cooperate with us?" She spoke in a professional tone.
George took off his glasses and placed them by the table next to his big hand, he rubbed his eyes with the other one. When he opened his eyes, he looked determined.
"According to the market research I asked for, six to nine months."
Cynthia placed her cup on the table a bit too hard, "That's way too long!"
"...Look, Cynthia, I want to bring him down too..." he paused, 'Possibly more than how much you do,' he added in his head. "It's not about cooperation, no supplier can risk antagonizing Evans-soft, they'll throw Henry's contracts away as soon as the debt he owes…."
He stopped when she squeezed her eyes shut as if she was in physical pain. The smart man concluded that hearing her ex's name was still painful for her. It was hard for George to mentally think about Henry's name too.
He made a promise to himself right then and there, 'I'll be the end of him,'